With only four days to work on a House-passed spending bill before current funding expires, Senators appearing on the Sunday morning news shows seemed unwilling to risk a government shutdown, and several promoted a stopgap bill.

Both chambers are in recess until Feb. 28, and the continuing resolution that is currently funding the government expires March 4. The House passed a spending bill for the remainder of fiscal 2011 that would reduce spending by more than $100 billion below President Barack Obama&rsquo;s 2011 request, but the Senate is expected to significantly alter the measure.

Senate Democratic Conference Vice Chairman Charles Schumer (N.Y.) called Sunday for a stopgap measure at current spending levels &ldquo;for a short time, a couple of weeks ... while House and Senate negotiators come up somewhere in the middle&rdquo; on the bill, which the House passed early Saturday morning.

&ldquo;I hope we can negotiate somewhere in the middle, that&rsquo;s obviously what should be done,&rdquo; he said on CNN&rsquo;s &ldquo;State of the Union.&rdquo; Schumer later added, &ldquo;We&rsquo;re going through [the House&rsquo;s] document right now; it&rsquo;s a big document with a whole lot of pages.&rdquo;

Sen. Lindsey Graham said Sunday that &ldquo;there will probably be a temporary CR.&rdquo;

&ldquo;The only reason I&rsquo;m suggesting we do a temporary CR for a week or two is we just don&rsquo;t have enough time,&rdquo; the South Carolina Republican said on NBC&rsquo;s &ldquo;Meet the Press.&rdquo;

House Democrats have proposed a stopgap measure at current spending levels through March 31, but Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Thursday that he would not move a stopgap that does not include reductions if the chambers fail to reach consensus before March 4.

&ldquo;Speaker Boehner seems to be on a course that would inevitably lead to a shutdown,&rdquo; Schumer said Sunday.

House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, however, told CBS&rsquo; &ldquo;Face the Nation&rdquo; that a shutdown is avoidable.

&ldquo;We are not going to accept these extremely high levels of spending. We&rsquo;re not looking for a government shutdown, and I think we&rsquo;ll have some negotiations with short-term extensions with spending cuts,&rdquo; the Wisconsin Republican said.&nbsp;Sen. Tom Coburn asserted on &ldquo;Fox News Sunday&rdquo; that a government shutdown is unlikely.

&ldquo;It&rsquo;s good for political rhetoric to talk about a government shutdown, but I don&rsquo;t know anybody that wants that to happen,&rdquo; the Oklahoma Republican said.

Still, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) said on &ldquo;Fox News Sunday&rdquo; that she believes it is unlikely that Congress will reach a compromise in the four days the Senate will be in session before the current spending measure expires.

&ldquo;I think we&rsquo;re serious about making cuts, I think we&rsquo;re serious about negotiating,&rdquo; McCaskill said. &ldquo;I think we can sit down immediately and begin working on that. We may need to extend slightly the current situation for a few days to get a compromise that works for the American people.&rdquo;

&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve made it clear from the start that that is the worst outcome,&rdquo; the Illinois Democrat said, when asked on &ldquo;Meet the Press&rdquo; whether a shutdown was imminent.

Sen. Dick Lugar suggested on &ldquo;State of the Union&rdquo; that the White House should convene a meeting of House and Senate leaders to discuss the &ldquo;severity&rdquo; of a possible government shutdown. &ldquo;This is a time for presidential leadership,&rdquo; the Indiana Republican said.